Part 2. A Garden Year. Proem

This is a story of real doings in a real garden - a garden that grew out of the wild.

It is too plain a tale to bear comparison with that which forms the burden of many garden books, which have little in them of the work of gardens.

It is actual hand labour which makes the joy of gardening. A person who strikes a cutting has a sense of triumph. The planting of a Rose or Cabbage is a personal achievement. The real garden worker may become so egotistical as to be a trial to his friends, but he will not be conscious of it, nor would he trouble about it if he were. He will be aggressively healthy, too, and profoundly happy.

Three people made the garden, Eunice, Wilkins, and the author. They took a weed-grown wild, reeking with every kind of vegetable enormity, and started amid the pity of friends. They worked, they schemed, they squabbled. Many times they were oppressed with the conviction of failure, but when folk began to come and solemnly aver the deep-rooted faith which they had long held in the possibilities of the place, the trio knew that they would triumph. A word, however, to the wise. Do not begin - except under pressure of circumstances - with an old, neglected garden; make a fresh start with a piece of plain ground, for your task will be clearer, easier, and cheaper.